GRAND JUNCTION, Col. -- By the time the Wabash Valley baseball team had left Mt. Carmel on Tuesday afternoon on a 14-hour journey here, they knew who they would be playing in the first round of the Juco World Series on Saturday.
The full 10-team double-elimination bracket was revealed by the NJCAA on Tuesday morning. WVC, a No. 3 seed overall, will play Salt Lake, Utah at 8:30 p.m. CDT on Saturday at Sam Suplizio Field in this baseball crazy western Colorado city of 66,000.
For Wabash Valley (53-11), the Midwest District champions, the visit is historic because of two reasons: it is the first in back-to-back years, and the first time a first-year head coach has brought a Warrior baseball team to the national tournament.
Aaron Biddle was an assistant coach to Hall of Famer Rob Fournier when the Warriors finished fourth in last year's tournament, only bowing out after eventual national champion Central Arizona walked off a 5-4 win in the semifinals.
Fournier left to become an assistant at Western Kentucky University. Now Biddle has his own WVC team playing for the title with many of the same characteristics as the recent Warrior past: 50-plus wins, a No. 1 ranking during the regular season, with offense and pitching statistics among the best in junior college baseball.
Salt Lake (31-18), the West District champions out of Region 18, is making history, too. It is the first time the Bruins have ever made it to this big junior college stage. Unranked in the final NJCAA Division I poll of the season, the Bruins will carry the No. 8 seed into the contest.
There are four games on the first day of the week-long tournament, with the first game of the second day marking the final first-round matchup. From there, the double-eliminated portion of the World Series kicks in, with two teams gone by the end of Day 2.
WVC is making its fourth trip to Suplizio, and has an all-time winning record at the tournament, with an overall mark of 7-6.
Biddle's team used three different modes of transportation in making the 1,239-mile journey to Grand Junction in little over half a day.
An advance group left Mt. Carmel early with equipment and luggage, driving straight to Denver. The players, staff, and others then boarded college vehicles at 4 p.m. bound for Lambert Airport in St. Louis.
They boarded a Frontier Airlines flight to Denver International Airport, arriving shortly before 1 a.m. Wednesday CDT, about the same time the equipment arrived in Mile High City.
A charter bus finished the trip, winding its way through the Rocky Mountain passes for 243 miles to Grand Junction, arriving at 5 a.m. MT. Notable attractions along that route included: Colorado Rockies home Coors Field, Denver Broncos home Empower Field at Mile High, and world-famous entertainment venue Red Rocks Amphitheatre.
Wabash Valley first played at the Juco World Series in 1989 for coach Bob Snyder. Fournier coached the next two Series teams, in 2017 and 2022.
FIRST ROUND PAIRINGS
Saturday, May 27
10:00 a.m. - #4 Weatherford, Tex. (50-9) vs. #7 Delgado, La. (45-11)
1:00 p.m. - #1 Central Florida (47-12) vs. #10 Andrew, Ga. (34-23)
4:00 p.m. - #2 Johnson County, Kan. (55-8) vs. #9 Shelton State, Ala. (31-28)
8:30 p.m. - #3 WABASH VALLEY (53-11) vs. #8 Salt Lake, Utah (31-18)
Sunday, May 28
11:00 a.m. - #5 Blinn, Tex. (44-13) vs. #6 Gaston, N.C. (49-11)
ALL TIMES CDT